The vote isn't even close anymore now that more FTers are aware of the discussion/vote.

Still being claimed that this is rigged/fixed/gamed? And/or that it's new people registering just to vote?? And that -only- those in favor of helpful voting feature are doing and/or organizing any such activity?

Or do those outlandish conspiracy theories seem a little silly now, in retrospect?

You know Jon, you're posts are bordering insulting.

I never claimed people were registering just to vote, however, it is not beyond the scope of possibility that people PM'd friends on FT and/or used other social media to get people to vote a certain way.

So, no, it's not silly.

And it's also not that important. But my opinion hasn't changed. I believe the strongest supporters are trying to game the voting system.

The only thing that's insulting in this thread is claiming the poll was gamed. You're accusing TalkBoard members of engaging in dishonest behavior over a poll to implement a "Like" button. Try to keep some perspective.

Yep, and I've rated other threads as well; but the "Rating" column remains blank for all threads.

Edited to add: I figured it out. After over 10 years on FT. :eek: You have to click on the word "Rating" and then it supposedly sorts the posts by rating, either ascending or descending. Pretty thoroughly useless because it doesn't give you a star or number rating for any of the posts.

Sigh. This is the kind of 1993-style functionality that's all over this IBB software.

I hate to break this to you, but I have never even mentioned the talk board, nor did the thought cross my mind.

That's about the number of votes most candidates get for TalkBoard positions, so yes, I'd say for better or worse it's legitimate in FT world.

You cannot possibly be insulted since I never mentioned you-- even by inference-- in the post you're responding to -AND- if you care to inform yourself, you'll see others (again, NOT YOU (if you can imagine! :))) most definitely made that **exact** claim early on in this thread.

Is this a lost cause I wonder? Not the vote, but trying to get some consistency and non-hypocracy in this discussion?

That's a problem FB has as well, and they seem to get the "why don't you have a dislike button" question often enough. For historical reasons, labeling it "like" is their thing... "+1" is Google's, and it's a bit more neutral. Could be "Thanks!" or "Helpful" or "Recognize this post" here -- there are little semantic differences, although I think most people who've been around the net for a while recognize the basic idea and kind of use it for the same thing.

I disagree that there's much difference, but it would be interesting (if not necessarily helpful) to see a poll asking whether people preferred one wording over the other or don't care.

Probably would be best done only if there were a decision (from TB, or otherwise) that going forward with the button with SOME wording was likely to happen.

So the thread has degenerated to discuss the poll. I guess no more valuable input will come and dearly hope nsx will soon state his case.

The poll has at this point collected 606 votes and thereby surpassed the TB election itself.

I would say more folk are aware of the poll but not really the discussion. I seriously doubt most are taking the time to read the wiki (which was just created), much less read over 560 posts. ;) It's a lot easier to vote in a poll (on any topic) than take time to participate (just like it's a lot easier to click on like than actually contribute to a discussion in a forum. :p :D).

BTW - between the yes/no votes there are an additional 40 votes since TM went out this morning. I was on FT early posting the wiki so I saw the post count. I would certainly expect more folk to vote between now & Sat since so many get TM, but it will be interesting to see what the final tally is in terms of # of votes overall (and I mean that for perhaps as a method to highlight future polls, not just specific to this issue - TB is capable of multi-tasking).

However, that doesn't negate that during a 48-hour period during the Xmas holidays when most FTers were drinking eggnog there were a substantial # of votes that didn't occur before or after that time frame, so sure I think some lobbying took place. As I've noted in the thread a few times, I would have said (and did) the same re: of which direction the voting went. I also said (more than once) that lobbying is allowed for both sides as long as it doesn't violate TOS.

I believe that TB members will consider BOTH the poll as well as the discussions that have have taken place in this thread - as they should. As others have noted, it's easy to click a button on a poll, but it's the discussions that bring out the pros, cons, potential difficulties, work-arounds, items that haven't been thought of before that allow TB members to get a handle on something (re: of what the topic is).

No she's not, nor has anyone else. As someone who just re-read all 566 posts in order to create the wiki, I can say not one FTer has accused a TB member of doing something "dishonest".

Cheers.

Great post-- appreciate the thoughtful reply.

Although I will just restate; I don't understand the impulse that some here had to say so quickly "didn't win, must be dirty tricks."

Don't split hairs:

The strongest supporter is nsx, a TalkBoard member.

Actually, if he is, it completely slipped my mind. NSX did not start the thread, and honestly, I don't believe I've read the whole thing. I didni't even realize he was for or against it.

I joined in when the poll was put up.

So, no, I did not intimate that the talk board, or even a single member of it, was trying to game the system.

Believe it or not, not everyone on FT is out to insult the talk board or push blame on them. Particularly me.

My own thoughts:

In favour

• posts marked by the community as helpful could assist others with the task of identifying valuable content for inclusion in wikiposts and other resource threads
• potentially declutters busy threads - reduction of duplicate comments etc. This thread is not a bad case in point

Downsides

• the user feedback plug-in selected by Internet Brands for last month's short trial lacked elegance IMHO. However that's not say this was the only plug-in available. There are plenty of forums with user feedback enabled that avoid over dominant "like" tags

Other thoughts

• I'm not convinced by claims that the user feedback tool will be gamed. As far as I have read there's no benefit to be gained by using the tool insincerely.
• if adopted, my preference is for universal adoption. No forum opt outs. We trust members to post responsibly so the same goes for providing user feedback to posts
• im not convinced that the tool will create or encourage cliquey behaviour although it may highlight existing cliquey behaviour
• personally, I believe this function should be given a proper trial run. It works on other bulletin boards, we have Internet Brands support and experience to guide us through this process